Sideways writer-director Alexander Payne is rumoured to be working on a new film, Downsizing, set to star Sacha Baron Cohen, Meryl Streep, Reese Witherspoon and Sideways-alum Paul Giamatti. (Hollywood Elsewhere)

Duck! Michael Bay is reportedly planning to film his remake of The Birds in 3-D. (Cinema Blend)

Jason Bateman will join George Clooney and his Juno director, Jason Reitman, in the new film, Up in the Air. (Variety)

Keira Knightly is set to star in the Fox Searchlight thriller Never Let Me Go, a cloning-themed film set to be directed by former music video helmer Mark Romanek. (Variety)

Samuel L. Jackson, Abigail Breslin and Maria Bello have signed on for the indie drama, Rape: A Love Story, based on a Joyce Carol Oates novella about a woman who is brutally raped and stalked by the perpetrators. Jackson will play the policeman protecting her and Breslin will be the rape victim’s daughter, who witnessed the attack. (Variety)

Former Gilmore Girl Alexis Bledel will check into ER for its two-hour series finale (People)

Production on season two of TNT’s drama Leverage will move from Los Angeles to Portland (PW)

Stop sending tubes of lipstick to NBC. After Lipstick Jungle’s Lindsay Price was cast in The Witches of Eastwick pilot last week, her co-star Kim Raver just joined the pilot for Shonda Rimes war-correspondent drama, Inside the Box. Brooke Shields, we imagine, is still keeping her options open. Let it go, Brooke. (THR)

Alyssa Milano, meanwhile, is set to play a successful lawyer in an untitled Warner Bros. comedy pilot (THR)